The mobile industry has been characterized by constant expansion and change ever since the very first mobile calls were launched and all the players in the mobile value chain have for the same reasons become used to having to a positive attitude towards changes and new tendencies. Flashy new mobile phones, faster networks and more entertainment geared for the small screen are all taking center stage.

The first most notable new trend is the touch interface technology. The iPhone revolutionized this trend together with the introduction of HTC’s TouchFLO technology on its HTC Touch. After the mammoth success of these phones, it’s predicted that the market will be flooded with touch-enables phones. The most exciting ones are the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 which cleverly incorporates the iPhone’s cover-flow interface into its phone’s user interface (UI), and the Samsung F480 with its newest touch UI codenamed TouchWiz.

Another significant trend noticed in the market nowadays is the big mobile phone manufacturers venturing into Microsoft’s Windows Mobile sector.

Sony Ericsson, the fourth-largest maker of mobile phones, announced last Sunday that it will offer its first handsets running on the Windows Mobile software, and the Windows Mobile software will be built into Sony Ericsson’s X1, the first in its new Xperia premium line of QWERTY keyboard multimedia phones that will be available in the second half of this year.

As for Nokia, the market leader in manufacturing mobile phones, despite its heavy use of the Symbian software across its newest phone lineup, rumors on a number of technology/mobility sites have suggested that Nokia is seriously considering the switch.

The latest mobiles are racing ahead of one another by providing speeds up to 7.2 MB/sec (available on some Vodafone networks). Mobile broadband allows you to access the Internet from anywhere on your mobile phone, or on your laptop computer. Speeds can be expected to reach up to 14.4 MB/sec. In the longer term, according to Carl-Henric Svanberg, Ericsson’s CEO, we can look forward to speeds of 200MB/sec with a technology standard called LTE (Long Term Evolution). “The increase speed of mobile broadband will have significant benefits for business and private users in countries, such as South Africa, where there has been a rapid uptake of mobile broadband. Not only will better access speeds stimulate further adoption of the mobile broadband but consumers will have faster access to online services via their cell phone,” said Simpson, director at Cape Town-headquartered global mobile messaging company BulkSMS.com .

The mobile industry is also working out possibilities to keep up with its social responsibility initiatives that address the recycling or re-issue of mobile products for a better environment. Nokia’s CEO, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, introduced his company’s latest cell phone offering, the Remade – a stylish mobile phone made completely from recycled materials. It has low energy consumption and is built with non-toxic electronics. The phone is to be launched in the market in the near future.